we'll figure this out
by beckasaurusrex
Summary: scott, stiles, and heartbreak. (or, scott seeing stiles cry, and the one time he can do something about it. and what comes of that.)


_i. your hands will always be too small to catch all the hurt you want to heal_

they're almost eight years old, and scott goes to the hospital with stiles every single day, when he visits his mother. scott likes mrs. stilinski, she's nice and smells lik flowers, even when hospitals don't.

at least, sometimes.

scott doesn't really know much about what's wrong with his friend's mom, he just knows that sometimes, she has good days, where she's warm and bright and likes to give hugs. and some days, she's the exact opposite, and even stiles is scared of her. (he won't admit to it, but scott knows his best friend well enough to know the bone chilling fear in his eyes.) those are the days that scott knows he needs to be there.

except, on the very worst day, he isn't there. no one is.

stiles doesn't come to school for three days. no one asks why, because everyone knows what happened. beacon hills is a relatively small town, things like the sheriff's wife dying are always big news.

scott is there, however, for the funeral.

he doesn't pay much attention to the things that people are saying, because he spends most of his time wishing he could stand right next to stiles. he needs to be there for his best friend. but his mom holds him back, as if he's supposed to just let stiles cry his eyes out with his father all alone. eight year old boys should never be alone when they've lost their mothers. scott swears he's abandoning stiles in that moment, and it makes him sick to his stomach.

from there on, he swears that he will never leave his best friend alone. he'd sooner burn the entire world to the ground.

_ii. monsters are real, and ghosts are real, too. they live inside of us, and sometimes, they win._

they're sixteen now, and scott swears that they're living in one of those horror movies that he and stiles used to watch, that'd keep them up all night. people die left and right, people that they care about. monsters are real; they're people and it's scarier than any story two teenage boys could ever come up with.

every inch of their lives has become haunted.

so when scott holds that road flare in his hand, the smell of smoke and gasoline wafting through his nose, so strong he might die just from fumes alone, none of this feels surprising.

"maybe i should be no one again," he says. or he thinks he does. he can't tell anymore. this body doesn't feel like his anymore.

but nothing makes his chest ache more than when he realizes that there are tears in stiles' eyes. oh, god. he did that this time. it isn't his mother or the broken heart over a pretty redhead. this is his fault. the sound of his heart breaking (no, 'breaking' is too simple a word - his heart feels like it's being shredded, demolished, burned to ashes in his chest) almost drowns out his best friend's words.

"you're someone. you're my best friend, okay? and i need you. scott, you're my brother, alright? so, if you are going to do this, you're just going to have to take me with you."

stiles' voice is thick, and scott doesn't even realize that somewhere between the first and last word of his best friend's speech, stiles had stepped into the gasoline with him. and scott wants to ell at him, tell him to get out, because then they'll both die, and stiles has too much hope left to do something so stupid, and -

he can feel the flames from far away. so close, though, is the pressing weight of his best friend, saving his life. he will never be able to thank him enough for this.

_iii. i love you in the same way there's a chapel in the hospital_

they're still sixteen, but scott wonders how they aren't decades older; how they haven't died. they're either incredibly lucky, or the universe has a sick sense of humor. he isn't sure what scares him more.

but then he finds out what they're looking for in stiles, and he realizes, that's what scares him most:

"there's no cure."

he might lose stiles. his brother, his soul mate; someone who means everything to him; someone he loves; someone he needs.

"i'll do something," scott promises, and he hates that he has to even offer this to stiles, of all people. he hates that this feels like his only option right now, to keep his best friend alive. but scott will do anything in the entire world if it means keeping stiles alive. absolutely anything.

he remembers being eight again, watching a tiny little stiles crying his eyes out, and feeling so helpless. he looks like that little boy again, scott thinks, seeming so small in that hospital gown, eyes big and helpless, but holding so much age, so much pain, scott wonders how they were ever young at all.

not knowing what else to do, scott pulls stiles in for a hug, like if he didn't, his best friend would just disappear. and he can feel stiles shaking, he can smell the boys fear and he knows there are tears that won't fall, and scott know that no amount of sledgehammers against his chest could compare to this, to the way he feels like his entire body is going to cave into itself. this is real heartbreak: the idea of losing someone so deeply embedded into who he is, that his body would sooner collapse than let the thought of losing them continue.

if something needs to be done to make sure that stiles stays alive, scott will do it. whatever it takes. if it means stiles gets to live, scott would tear the universe apart at the seams.

_iv. wearing thin down to the core_

they're older now, not by much, but time seems to be dragging so slowly that scott can't seem to tell how long it's really been since - since everything. but he doesn't care - the slower time goes, the more time he gets to spend with stiles.

it happens on a tuesday. scott won't ever forget it as long as he lives. it's a dreary tuesday, cold and bitter outside, and scott's at home because it's his turn to cook dinner, and stiles is supposed to come over after his doctor's appointment. (he goes there a lot lately, and the smell of it always lingers on him. after a while, it stopped making scott sick to his stomach.)

scott's in the middle of chopping an onion of all things when stiles comes in, and scott almost cries for real, because he can't stop thinking of all the promises they'd made, where they'd live together during college, and how they might not make it there anymore, and -

"scott, i don't want to die."

the knife falls from his hand and nothing else matters except the fact that stiles is crying and scott needs to do something about this.

"stiles, stiles, i can - i can help you. you just have to trust me," he says, his hand rubbing up and down his best friend's back, and he doesn't think he can breathe until stiles takes in a giant gulp of air. oxygen has never tasted so sweet.

scott puts his hands on stiles' shoulders, as if to steady him, and stiles is shaking, tears still leaking from his eyes but he manages, in a thick voice, "please. scott, please, i don't want to die. i need you to - please." and scott knows exactly what he's asking for. he'd promised this to him, but he needed stiles to choose this first.

when stiles gulps, swallowing against the lump in his throat as scott's eyes glow red, all scott does is reach for his best friend's hand, let him squeeze against the pain as scott's fangs sink into his forearm.

he's doing something.

_v. the bite is a gift_

scott paces for three hours while stiles sleeps. every so often he will lean over, sniff around just to make sure stiles still smells alive, is still warm; he'll check the bite under the bandage and just...make sure everything is okay. this has to work. stiles has to be okay.

the sun is coming up, and his mother walks through the door when stiles' eyes open.

they glow amber.

scott has never seen a more beautiful color in his life.


End file.
